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Long Distance Training

In the 5th Century a bloke called Phidippides was a professional runner.  To cut a very long story short, at the battle of Marathon the Athenian army was defeated the odds and gave the Persians something of a major kick in.  Outnumbered 4 to 1 they launched a surprise but seemingly suicidal offensive.  Astonishingly, by day’s end, 6,400 Persian bodies lay dead on the field against 192 Athenian casualties! The surviving Persians fled to sea and headed south to Athens where they hoped to attack the city before the Greek Army could re-assemble there.

Phidippides was asked to run 26 miles to Athens to carry the news of the victory and the warning about the approaching Persian ships.  He had already run to Sparta and back (3 days) and had been fighting all day…but he went for it.  Taking 3 hours he got the message to those concerned and promptly dropped dead from exhaustion.  Out of that less than encouraging beginning, the marathon challenge was born!

You may or may not know, I am currently in training to run the London Marathon at the end of April.  To be honest with you, its been a bit of an ask to get out there in the freezing cold during winter and run for what seems like an endless period of time for no reason other than to be able to run further the next time I go out.  Further more, sometimes I’ve been wondering why on earth I’m doing it as in the real world I will never actually need to run 26.2 miles.  I mean, there are far more civilised ways to get about…

There have been some advantages: I’ve had lots of time to think, I’ve shed a few more pounds and I can eat whatever I like (sometimes)!   Furthermore, the parallels between running for hours and my life leading CVM have been profound.  It’s been tough to build up the mileage.  Its relentless effort for small gains.  Much of the time I’m in mild discomfort and it has felt like pushing a boulder up hill.  There has been no glamour in the training and much of what I have been doing has been unseen.  It’s even been unappreciated! One or two people who have picked up on what I am doing have decided to stop supporting CVM because they aren’t into marathons! (If only they knew!!!)

Building a movement is much the same.  Whether that is in your local community, church or across the UK.  Its tough work building something brick by brick.  Sometimes it feels like you have made little progress or have even gone backwards.  Furthermore, it often feels that if you don’t keep pushing the boulder it will just fall back on top of you and squash you!

I’ve realised in all of this how important to me encouragement is.  We really need to work on this as a national movement.  I’ve been wondering how we can better support one another or link up together.  Are there some core aims/values we need to all get behind as a band of brothers and put in front of all the CVM groups?  Do we need to find a way to facilitate support and help as we continue to get out there and push the boulder?  The thing is, just one word of encouragement from a mate when I’m training and I feel on top of the world.  It means so much doesn’t it when someone really gets behind you.

A couple of years ago I spoke about friendly fire and fostering an encouraging ethos at our annual conference (look out for a podcast).  I spoke then about honking geese … ask me more when you see me or google it!  Needless to say, my conclusion was that we all need to honk at each other a little bit more.

Keep going brothers.  Say strong, keep in touch, share the ups and downs with us and keep pushing that boulder …

Deo Optimo Maximo!

Carl

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By Carl Beech – March 8, 2010

Night Lies

Within ten minutes of arriving in London, I found £20 on the floor. I knew it would be a good weekend. As I strolled down Great Portland Street to meet a good friend I had not seen for years, I saw a homeless gentleman sitting up against a red letter box. He looked like Bob Dylan.

I asked him if he had eaten, he said no. I nipped into Tesco and bought him a cheese sandwich and a bottle of Lucozade. He smiled and for a minute I thought he was Bob Dylan.

I enquired if he was plugged into a local church – but he wasn’t. But then he told me that he did however meet up every week with a group of Christians who “made sure he was alright’. He guessed I was a Christian and showed me his bible. He held it like a trophy. I smiled and left him to devour his sandwich paid for by the poor sod who dropped £20 earlier on.

Five hours later I was humming Bob Dylan songs in London’s most prestigious nightclub (according to some fancy magazine).

It was breathtaking and so were the prices. I didn’t fit in at all. I was surrounded by tory boys with expensive haircuts and pink shirts. I felt like an undercover miner looking for revenge on Margaret Thatcher for closing down the Welsh Valleys. I only kicked off once though. It was after being charged £2 to keep my coat and bag in the cloakroom. “That is a scandal” I said. “This is the best club in London” he said. “Its got nothing on Preston’s Wetherspoons” I said. The security guards glanced over at me. I didn’t say anything else.

As I stood in the 6th floor heated gardens overlooking the nation’s capital, illuminated by night light, starlight and moonlight, I became aware of something which had been niggling at me for about two years.

It was this: I have no interest in earning copious amounts of cash. I don’t want it. I don’t want to be seen in fancy clubs by women who laugh the same, dress the same, eat the same and dance the same. I couldn’t give a toss about the latest Paul Smith range of after shaves. Nothing inside me wants to be known as a friend of the celebrities. I don’t want some idiot pretending to be my mate by kissing me on the cheek whilst splurting out how good I look.

If the best this world can offer is yuppy utopia, then it can shove it right up its arse.

Get this: in the toilet of this a-list club I was told by a stranger that I wouldn’t find anything better. He said, “this is what it’s all about bro.” As I washed my hands under the silver taps I looked at him in the mirror, square in the eyes, and said “no it’s not”.

You could offer me a lifetime membership at this place and I would still choose to spend my Friday nights with my bread-stealing flatmate Mark talking about Jesus. And why? Because the best of the British is farcical compared to the message of Jesus, who says to be free, and free indeed. He says do not to be slaves to culture, do not bow down at the cloakroom of the famous, do not orgasm at the idea of being liked by pretty people with fluffy hair.

Jesus says plant yourself on his promise. Root your heart on the Scriptures and give yourself to loving your friends ferociously. The sight of the homeless Bob Dylan tucking into his lunch, and the knowledge that this week a group of Christian brothers will meet with him to express love, IS what its all about. That’s life to the full. That’s where joy can be found. That’s where freedom can be seen. That’s where hope can be held.

Do not be deceived.

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By Alex Willmott – March 5, 2010

Shot In The Back

Jonathan Sherwin shares some thoughts on fighting together on the same side.

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By Jonathan Sherwin – March 1, 2010

Hope For Sale

When a chiropractor says “I’m going to cuff you to the bed and manipulate you” something inside you wakes up. When they continue to inflict a wave of pain on your lower spine and diagnose you with a defected joint, book you in for an X-Ray and tell you the condition is “most interesting”, something inside you starts to get a bit scared. “I hope it’s not serious” I said.

I drove from the surgery two inches taller and tried to think about something other than the possibility of having an operation on my back. So, I thought about my imminent MOT which was scaring my Fiat Punto so much that the car was shaking. All the time. “I hope its not expensive” I mumbled to my dodgy gearbox.

On my return home I received a text from a French friend about Wales’ biggest game of the Six Nations tonight. I thought about how much it was going hurt if I saw us get beat by the blue-shirted bread lovers. “I hope we score early” I said.

As I caught a glimpse of my “hopeful” face in my interior mirror, I noticed that when I hope I frown a lot.

Why is that I “hope” for things but what I actually mean is this: My life is not floating my boat at the moment and there’s a few things that need to happen before I can take a big sigh and start to think happy thoughts. When my X-Ray comes back clear, my car passes its MOT, and Wales hammer the French, well then, and only then, can I stop frowning. Then, and only then, I won’t need to hope for anything else.

The other day I sang a song about Jesus. It was weirdly apt for my week of false hope. The first line of the song hit me between the eyes reminding me that the the things of this world WILL pass away. Cars, spines, rugby, frowns, jobs. The whole lot. It’s not going to last.

Check the first verse out of this hymn about Jesus.

In Christ alone my hope is found, he is my light, my strength, my song;
This Cornerstone, this solid Ground, firm through the fiercest drought and storm.
What heights of love, what depths of peace, when fears are stilled, when strivings cease!
My Comforter, my All in All, here in the love of Christ I stand.

Where is my hope? In my job which is here today and gone when the company wants to save some funds? In my body which fails on impact? In my car which sounds like Gollum retching?

If it is, then I’m in a spot of bother. Jesus is quite clear about this world. Though he died for it, gave his spirit to it, and is coming back for it, he tells all his followers not to put their hope in it.

In Christ Alone.

The interest rate is a lot higher.

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By Alex Willmott – February 26, 2010

Nine Years

Nine years ago this week I became a Christian. (That’s a weird turn of phrase isn’t it?)

I celebrated the occasion with my bread-stealing flat mate Mark. Together, we sat in front of the box, cracked open a bottle of Sailor Jerry Rum, and talked about life, love and loaves.

If someone had told me I was going to become a Christian on the morning of February 16 2001, I would have probably told them to have a drink and drive to the coast.

Though I had paid two very unsatisfying visits to the local church, I was still living my daily life as if I was in complete control. To be honest, until around 7.35pm that evening, my heart actually believed that whatever felt good, was good. It was a surprisingly liberating experience to find out that I wasn’t the man at the centre of the universe.

Since that moment when I honestly asked the Jesus spoken of in the bible to lead me in my daily life, I have had to constantly fight the temptation of reclaiming the throne of my existence.

The weird thing is, that until recently, I looked back on that day as a 16-year-old in Cardiff and thought it was the most important day of my life. But it was not.

From looking closer at the stuff in the New Testament I now know that today is the only day that matters. The message that Jesus came to bring to this earth was “Today if you hear my voice, do not harden your heart.” Jesus did not say, “In your own time, when you’ve got your life sorted out, come and see me.”

I’ll be honest with you. These last six months have tested my faith in ways I couldn’t imagine when I was a teenager. Grief has really had me by the balls recently, and though my emotions are often mirroring that of a monkey on LSD, I am so happy that Jesus is still in my life.

The number of mistakes I’ve made in the last nine years as a Christian is quite simply embarrassing. Which makes the fact that Jesus not counting my sins against me sound so good.

And not only that, since that day I put him at the front of my mind, he has been strengthening my faith and character. And the truth is he doesn’t seem to be running for the door any time soon. So nine years later, here I am.

And as Mark and I took a fair chunk of rum and coke on-board, I shed a few tears looking back at the last six months. (Don’t worry lads, I’m going rugby training later tonight to man up a bit.)

But because of recent losses to people close to me I am always a few steps away from a good cry. However, I also felt an overwhelming sense of sadness for my many friends and family members who do not have God as an anchor in their lives yet.

I thought about how accessible a living relationship with God was and how a whispered prayer of tiny faith started the most immense journey of joy, adventure and truth any boy could wish for.

Nostalgia got the better of me and I prayed the same prayer that kicked it all off before I went to sleep to mark the 9th year anniversary of my Christian faith.

“Lord Jesus, I reckon you are who the bible says you are. I want you to be my Lord. I’m so sorry its taken me all this time to admit all this. I’m also sorry for ignoring you and doing it my way. Thank you for dying on that cross for us Jesus. I believe. Amen.”

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By Alex Willmott – February 19, 2010

Love Your Uni – York: 20th Feb

The Love Your Uni tour is coming to York on Saturday 20th Feb. Our very own Carl Beech will be taking part, along with loads of others.

Be sure to check out Love Your Uni on Facebook and follow them on Twitter.

For now, check out Luke Smith as he introduces Love Your Uni York.

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By Jonathan Sherwin – February 17, 2010

Mark Stubbs: Hurricane Survivor

Mark Stubbs held a bunch of men in suspense as he gave his story at the beginning of the month. John, a CVM Group Leader, has the details …

At the Reading Men’s Breakfast on Saturday 6 February, nearly 100 men heard Mark Stubbs give an amazing account of his attempts to row across the Atlantic Ocean from West to East to beat a record set up 108 years ago The first attempt failed after 21 days rowing when the rudder broke.

On the second attempt he and his crew got within 300 miles of home when a hurricane overtook them. The boat capsized in the 50-foot waves and, whilst Mark was initially trapped in the hull he wondered if he should pray. However he reasoned that as he did not really believe in God, it was a bit hypocritical to call on Him in a crisis!

Fortunately his wife and daughters were praying for him. The signal from the boat’s distress beacon was picked up by a freighter only 50 miles away and changed course to rescue them. Even then it took an hour and a half to get them on board once the vessel was alongside, as the sea was so rough. Mark had us all on the edge of our seats as he recounted the rescue.

Once home Mark was encouraged to find out something more about God and went on an Alpha course. Subsequently he believed in Jesus and now is pleased to tell others about how he was saved!

Nowadays he is happy to spend more time with his family and has not made further attempts on the Atlantic.

Mark’s story is a combination of determination, preparation and planning, together with the over-ruling hand of God on his life. I can thoroughly recommend his talk to other CVM Groups.

For CVM partners, you can log in to the Partners Area to find Mark’s contact details to request that he speak at your event. Alternatively, find out more about becoming a CVM partner or find a group near you.

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By Jonathan Sherwin – February 16, 2010

February e:Quip

Carl Beech shares his thanks on behalf of CVM for the overwhelming support received from our January newsletter.

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By Jonathan Sherwin – February 15, 2010

Fake ID

My voice started to waver as the Welsh national anthem came to a close. Singing alongside my Welsh brethren in a packed English bar as our homeland took on the infamous white army in Twickenham, was quite simply an honour. Our pocket of Welsh escapees had taken over a Preston watering hole with choral bombardments and banter to the highest level. I could imagine Jesus sitting with both sets of fans laughing out loud over a neutral pint of Guinness. (Probably wearing a Welsh shirt though).

Just before kick off a man standing just to the left of me pointed straight in my direction and started chanting “sheep shagger”. Though I have heard this insult a thousand times spilling from English lips, it still hurts. But why does it hurt!? Quite simply because its true. Not really, but I thought that would get your attention.

It’s the most average insult to use on anyone. The likelihood of it being true is so remote, its like me calling someone a petrol drinker, or a cloud maker.

So why does it hurt? It hurts because its the here and now, its the circumstances, its the six inches in front of my face.

Things just hurt. Like when my boss doesn’t thank me for going the extra mile, or when I’m mocked for going to bed early, or when one of the lads takes pity on my inability to relate with women by suggesting I try men, or when nobody asks you how you are on a really bad day, or when the little chav calls you a cube headed geek, or when the girl doesn’t feel the same way about you.

The here and now hurts. The here and now seemingly has complete control of how I feel.

However, after reading a bit about Jesus, I have come to the conclusion that there is a difference between living for the here and now and being controlled by it.

Jesus calls his followers to be in the world, to sympathise with the sad, to grieve with those in mourning, to stay alert everyday and to work hard. We are called to throw ourselves at life.

But he also calls us not to be governed by what we see. In fact, he calls us to be governed only by what is unseen.

Consider these words by Paul the Apostle:

But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body. Philippians 3 vs 20 to 24

I don’t think Paul’s identity would have been rocked by off-handed comments.

Peace.

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By Alex Willmott – February 12, 2010

Discs – Part 2

So I’m through the op. It’s not nearly as bad a thing as many blokes who may read this have had to face. But I’ve allowed myself to get down and frustrated over this. There have been weeks stuck in the house, off work, a premature retirement and being made to face for myself, the sort of risks/benefits decision, as a medic I ask my patients to take. Like the decision to have a treatment which carries risks, not as a life saver (as it often is with my patients), but to give me full exercise capability in the long term. For instance, getting back to 100 mile-a-day cycle treks across France, with the mad Revd. Beech. And after making the decision, with difficulty, I get an infection so the op’s delayed for a week with one day to go and the risks increase and other things go wrong.

Nothing new for many blokes reading this, but one of the things I do best is worry. I’ve done dangerous sports in the past and now, extreme (some would say) endurance cycling, which literally reduces grown men to tears. But through it all, I worry. I worry about all sorts of things, not just this. During these frustrating weeks, I’ve been reading the first part of the Book of Psalms. It’s all there; The Lord is always with you and will guard you and guide you through everything including in David’s case, life and death situations, not just non-urgent back surgery. That’s the unchanging truth in Scripture and that’s enough for anybody. But because I’m weak and a worrier, I keep asking God to give me some more reassurance that I’ve made the right decision. But I’m not looking around for ‘signs.’ I don’t do that, much.

Then 2 days before the final date of the op, I’m reading a national daily paper. I don’t get it normally; I’ve just read it a few times while stuck in the house and not for several days previously. Again, my mind’s a million miles away from ‘signs’. I’m just browsing, filling in the boring hours, when I realise I’m reading an article featuring my surgeon and the hospital where I’m going to be a patient. It’s not a complaint, by the way, it features him as a leading expert in something. Then, at the top of another article on the same page, I catch sight of a photograph of a familiar face–someone who was a medical student in my year, who now does medical articles for that paper. I haven’t read one for years, but that day, his column was about the latest evidence showing that the best treatment for people with back problems like mine is not to mess about delaying things with physio etc, (the previous traditional way to deal with it), but to get on with early surgery–which was just what I had decided.

Carl came to see me and I showed him the page. And just as though to underline it, while we’re talking, in a lull in the conversation, a voice on the radio solemnly names the newspaper. We both smiled and thanked God. This sort of ‘fleece’ experience hardly ever happens to me, but when it does, it comes completely unexpectedly. I shouldn’t require it and I don’t deserve it and it’s always possible to dismiss it as a coincidence. But I’m taking it as a kind reassurance to a worrier at just the right time, from a God who amazingly cares about details. What do you think?

I went for my op with much more confidence. The lesson I suppose is to be thankful for the health I‘ve got and when fit again, to strengthen my all too weak resolve to use it in following Jesus–and perhaps, to try and stop worrying so much. Lord help me to do that.

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By Dr. Ian Manifold – February 11, 2010